ity various diplomatic functions at the Northern courts. Th— was a tall, dark, saturnine youth, sparing of speech, with raven locks. Thomas Fanshaw Middleton followed him (now Bishop of Calcutta) a scholar and a gentleman in his teens. He has the reputation of an excellent critic; and is author (besides the Country Spectator) of a Treatise on the Greek Article, against Sharpe.-M. is said to bear his mitre high in India, where the regni novitas 49 (I dare say) sufficiently justifies the bearing. A humility quite as primitive as that of Jewel 50 or Hooker might not be exactly fitted to impress the minds of those AngloAsiatic diocesans with a reverence for home institutions, and the church which those fathers watered. The manners of M. at school, though firm, were mild, and unassuming. Next to M. (if not senior to him) was Richards, author of the Aboriginal Britons, the most spirited of the Oxford Prize Poems: a pale, studious Grecian. Then followed poor S M-! 52 of these the Muse is silent, Finding some of Edward's race 53 -,51 ill-fated Come back into memory, like as thou wert in the day-spring of thy fancies, with hope like a fiery column before thee the dark pillar not yet turned Samuel Taylor Coleridge- Logician, Metaphysician, Bard! How have I seen the casual passer through the Cloisters stand still, entranced with admiration (while he weighed the disproportion between the speech and the garb of the young Mirandula),54 to hear thee unfold, in thy deep and sweet intonations, the mysteries of Jamblichus, or Plotinus 55 (for even in those years thou waxedst not pale at such philosophic draughts), or reciting Homer in his Greek, or Pindar while the walls of the old Grey Friars re-echoed to the accents of the inspired charity-boy! Many were the "wit-combats" (to dally awhile with the words of old Fuller) between him and C. V. Le G- 566 which two I behold like a Spanish great gallion, and an English man-of-war; Master Coleridge, like the former, was built far higher in learning, solid, but slow in his performances. C. V. L., with the English man-ofwar, lesser in bulk, but lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, tack about, and take advantage of all winds, by the quickness of his wit and invention.” 57 Nor shalt thou, their compeer, be quickly forgotten, Allen, with the cordial smile, and still more cordial laugh, with which thou wert wont to make the old Cloisters shake, in thy cognition of some poignant jest of theirs; or the anticipation of some more material, and, peradventure, practical one, of thine own. Extinct are those smiles, with that beautiful countenance, with which (for thou wert the Nireus formosus 58 of the school), in the days of thy maturer waggery, thou didst disarm the wrath of infuriated town-damsel, who, incensed by provoking pinch, turning tigress-like round, suddenly converted by thy angel-look, exchanged the half-formed terrible "bl," for a gentler greeting -"bless thy handsome face!" Next follow two, who ought to be now alive, and the friends of Elia - the junior Le Gand F -and F; 59 who impelled, the former by a roving temper, the latter by too quick a sense of neglect—ill capable of enduring the slights poor Sizars are sometimes subject to in our seats of learning-exchanged their Alma Mater for the camp; perishing, one by climate, and one on the plains of Salamanca: - Le G — sanguine, volatile, sweet-natured; F dogged, faithful, anticipative of insult, warm-hearted, with something of the old Roman height about him. 9 Fine, frank-hearted Fr 60 the present master of Hertford, with Marmaduke T- 61 mildest of Missionaries and both my good friends still close the catalogue of Grecians in my time. MRS. BATTLE'S OPINIONS ON WHIST "A CLEAR fire, a clean hearth,* and the rigour of the game." This was the celebrated wish of old Sarah Battle (now with God) who, next to her devotions, loved a good game at whist. She was none of your lukewarm gamesters, your half and half players, who have no objection to take a hand, if you want one to make up a rubber; who affirm that they have no pleasure in winning; that they like to win one game and lose another; that they can while away an hour very agreeably at a card-table, but are indifferent whether they play or no; and will desire an adversary, who has slipt a wrong card, to take it up and play another.* These insufferable triflers are the curse of a table. One of these flies will spoil a whole pot. Of such it may be said, that they do not play at cards, but only play at playing at them. Sarah Battle was none of that breed. She detested them, as I do, from her heart and soul; and would not, save upon a striking emergency, willingly seat herself at the same table with them. She loved a thoroughpaced partner, a determined enemy. She took, and gave, no concessions. She hated favours. She never made a revoke, nor ever passed it over in her adversary without exacting the utmost forfeiture. She fought * This was before the introduction of rugs, Reader. You must remember the intolerable crash of the unswept cinders betwixt your foot and the marble. *As if a sportsman should tell you he liked to kill a fox one day and lose him the next. a good fight: cut and thrust. She held not her good sword (her cards) "like a dancer." She sat bolt upright; and neither showed you her cards, nor desired to see yours. All people have their blind side — their superstitions; and I have heard her declare, under the rose, that Hearts was her favourite suit. I never in my lifeof the best years of itsaw her take out her snuffbox when it was her turn to play; or snuff a candle in the middle of a game; or ring for a servant, till it was fairly over. She never introduced or connived at miscellaneous conversation during its process. As she emphatically observed, cards were cards: and' if I ever saw unmingled distaste in her fine last-century countenance, it was at the airs of a young gentleman of a literary turn, who had been with difficulty persuaded to take a hand; and who, in his excess of candour, declared, that he thought there was no harm in unbending the mind now and then, after serious studies, in recreations of that kind! She could not bear to have her noble occupation, to which she wound up her faculties, considered in that light. It was her business, her duty, the thing she came into the world to do, and she did it. She unbent her mind afterwards over a book. and I knew Sarah Battle many Pope was her favourite author: his Rape of the Lock her favourite work. She once did me the favour to play over with me (with the cards) his celebrated game of Ombre in that poem; and to explain to me how far it agreed with, and in what points it would be found to differ from, tradrille. Her illustrations were apposite and poignant; and I had the pleasure of sending the substance of them to Mr. Bowles: 2 but I sup |